et he dreamed; and his dream was to him as a terrible
nightmare.

What if he were wrong! What if those two philosophers had on their
side some truth! He would fain be honest if he knew the way. What if
those names upon his list were the names of false gods, whose worship
would lead him to a hell of swindlers instead of the bright heaven of
commercial nobility! "Barlywig is in Parliament," he said to himself,
over and over again, in loud tones, striving to answer the spirit
of his dream. "In Parliament! He sits upon committees; men jostle
to speak to him; and he talks loud among the big ones of the earth.
He spends forty thousand a year in his advertisements, and grows
incredibly rich by the expenditure. Men and women flock in crowds to
his shop. He lives at Albert Gate in a house big enough for a royal
duke, and is the lord of ten thousand acres in Yorkshire. Barlywig
cannot have been wrong, let that philosopher philosophize as he
will!" But still the dream was there, crushing him like a nightmare.

"Why don't you produce something, so as to make the world richer?"
Poppins had said. He knew well what Poppins had meant by making the
world richer. If a man invent a Katakairion shirt, he does make the
world richer; if it be a good one, he makes it much richer. But the
man who simply says that he has done so adds nothing to the world's
wealth. His answer had been that it was his work to sell the shirts,
and that of the purchaser to buy them. Let each look to his own work.
If he could be successful in his selling, then he would have a right
to be proud of his success. The world would be best served by close
attention on the part of each to his own business. Such had been
the arguments with which he had silenced his friend and contented
himself, while the excitement of the shop in Bishopsgate Street was
continued; but now, as he sat there upon the gate, this dream came
upon him, and he began to doubt. Could it be that a man had a double
duty, each separate from the other;--a duty domestic and private,
requiring his devotion and loyalty to his wife, his children, his
partners, and himself; and another duty, widely extended in all its
bearings and due to the world in which he lived? Could Poppins have
seen this, while he was blind? Was a man bound to produce true shirts
for the world's benefit even though he should make no money by so
doing;--either true shirts or none at all?

The evening light fell upon him as he still sat